Tuesday 31 March 2009

News, news and more news

The DAAD (translates as the German Academic Exchange Service) will screen My DDR T-Shirt in Belgrave Square, London. The screening takes place on 20th June and is part of a regular programme of events organised for DAAD's membership of German lecturers and teachers.

I have been invited to present the film and answer questions at the end - and I'm very much looking forward to it. This screening is significant for the simple reason that it was not generated by me. This has happened because someone attended the Durham screening and recommended my film to the DAAD. Huge thanks to Kai in Durham and Eva Peters at DAAD.

I'm proud to announce that Hawkinsian Productions recently signed its first contract. The contract committed My DDR T-Shirt to the British Federation of Film Societies' (BFFS) national distribution scheme.

There are hundreds of film societies throughout the UK. From remote villages to urban enthusiasts, film societies make independent and foreign films accessible to everyone - "Cinema for all" is their motto. Being part of the BFFS scheme is a huge compliment and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it'll will lead to new screenings.

As an additional bit of news, My DDR T-Shirt may also be screened at the BFFS national conference in September. We're keeping our fingers crossed.

Finally, alongside the Spanish subtitled edit (being worked on currently), I've recently had some very generous offers for Finnish and Dutch translations. These offers came out of the blue as responses to my website pages 'Get involved'. Both people have offered to work on the project for free. The Finnish one is especially timely as a Finnish TV company recently responded to my offer to send them a preview DVD. Indeed, I've just had an email from a Hungarian channel asking for a preview DVD. I wonder whether anything will come of this? Yet another thing to keep my fingers crossed about.

Nearly a year since finishing the film, My DDR T-Shirt is still coming up with pleasant surprises. It's proving to be a great project and a massive success in its own little way.

Long may it continue!

Friday 6 March 2009

Durham and other news

Thursday 26th February was a great night for My DDR T-Shirt. The third public screening took place at Durham University and went very well indeed. The night was organised by Durham’s Ethnographic Film Society and was well attended. There was also a really healthy Q&A session at the end – and this kinda continued in the pub afterwards.

Huge thanks go to Stefan Shanker and his friends at EthnoFilm. Thank you.

Other news to mention is that the Spanish translation of the full audio transcript is now complete. A dude called Juan-Carlos Carrillo went to considerable effort on the translation and this will be used to make a Spanish edit of the film. For Spanish speakers, this translation document is so far available by special email request only.

A very kind offer has recently come in to translate My DDR T-Shirt into Finnish – which was gratefully accepted. Who knows when this will be available (it’s a big job) but if you’re interested just send an email and I’ll send it out when I get it.

And finally, there is news of some investment here at Hawkinsian Productions. We are now the proud owners of a ‘proper’ video camera – a Sony DSR PD150. This broadcast quality camera is not the state of the art but it’s a considerable upgrade of current Hawkinsian facilities. We are very excited about new projects and can’t wait to make use of the new camera.